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What’s the Best Online Marketplace to Sell On Today

Posted By Seller Panda comments October 23, 2014

If you’re trying to decide on which marketplace to sell you probably already heard plenty of arguments why this marketplace is great and why another one is awful. The thing is that you can judge an online marketplace just based on one factor, you need to look at this holistically and take into account a few different factors including: what products sell best where, listing & selling fees, branding options and how the policies of each marketplace will affect you as a seller.

The 3 top online marketplace that we will compare to answer this questions are: eBay, Amazon and Etsy.

eBay

Pros:

Auction-style – eBay is the leading online auction marketplace, so if you sell one-of-a-kind items or collectibles, the option to sell through auction is definitely a huge plus.

Trust – eBay’s buyer protection acts as a double-edged sword. Even though sellers do tend to feel as though this system is unfair, this system after all works and it helps seller close more sales.

Branding & tools – eBay sellers do have plenty of freedom when it comes to designing their stores and listings. Also, US eBay sellers have access to eBay’s app center that offers them a variety of marketing & customer service tools.

Cons:

Listing & PayPal fees- having to pay listing fees means you are paying upfront with no guarantee that your product will sell, that’s quite a big minus, especially when you’re paying to relist the item. In addition eBay sellers need to pay a processing charge to PayPal which adds also to the total fees.

Time consuming -Since buyer feedback system is such a huge factor on eBay, sellers spend relatively a lot of time attending to buyers. Which is quite a downside to selling on eBay.

Unpaid sales – Payment isn’t guaranteed upon “sale” and the hassle of reminding the buyer to pay falls on the seller. So more time spent attending to buyers and less security for the seller.

Amazon

Pros:

Better for fixed-priced items- overall prices for the same items are higher on Amazon than on eBay, which means you can get more for your fixed-price products. Of course other calculations need to be taken into such as commissions, but overall for fixed-priced products (as opposed to collectibles and OOAK items) Amazon is a better choice.

Less time consuming – Amazon buyers do expect a high level of customer service, but also they expect little interaction with the seller. Which means the Amazon seller less needs to be occupied with customer service. Even more so with Amazon’s fulfillment Program.

Fulfillment by Amazon – In the Fulfillment by Amazon program sellers ship their products to Amazon and Amazon takes care of everything following the purchase from shipping to providing full customer service.This not only frees more of your time, but it can also help you with shipping internationally.

No need for photos/description- If you’re selling a product that is already on Amazon, you won’t have to take photos of your product or write a lengthy description since it will already have a product detail page. Other the other hand, if you do have a unique product that isn’t on Amazon you’ll have to follow very strict guidelines for taking photos.

Cons:

No branding – Amazon gives you little to no options of branding your items. Branding on Amazon is limited to product descriptions & photos, which is why sellers on Amazon have a hard time building their brand & gaining customer loyalty.

No remarketing options – Amazon offers sellers no remarketing options, such as sending a personal post-purchase email to buyers or inviting buyers to join your newsletter.

Pros:

Very chic – Etsy started out in 2005 so it’s pretty young and chic, but at the same time highly popular and steadily growing.

User-friendly – The etsy user interface is super friendly and makes it very easy to list items, process orders, and print shipping labels.

Free store – Unlike eBay you don’t need to pay a monthly subscription fee to have a store, every seller on etsy automatically has a store.

Cons:

Fees – Transaction fees are lower on Etsy than on other marketplaces, but the listing fee is a fixed $0.2 fee. There is an additional PayPal processing fee or direct checkout fee.

Limited branding – Etsy’s branding across the site is quite overpowering, but a little branding is possible on Etsy with the option of adding a store banner and a profile image. But with the little branding that you have, you really need to have a very unique product to stand out.

It’s hard to point out one marketplace as the best marketplace to be on, since each has it’s advantages. You can only decide what’s the best marketplace for you by taking all these points into account and based on that deciding what will be the best choice for you and the products that you have to offer.

Do you think a certain marketplace has an advantage or disadvantage that we left out? If you do, we would love to hear it, just leave us a comment!